Monthly Archives: November 2006

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You can take the team out of San Francisco but you can’t take the San Francisco out of … oh, never mind.
With the 49ers looking to leave their hearts but not their franchise in San Francisco, one legislator wants to make them leave the name behind, too.
Assemblyman Mark Leno, D-San Francisco, plans to introduce a bill that would prohibit any professional sports team from using San Francisco in its name if it doesn’t actually play in the city.
The name San Francisco has cachet all over the world as a number one destination spot,” Leno said. I dont think San Franciscos name should automatically be able to be used by a franchise that is not located in the city.”
Hmm. Someone oughta explain that one to the Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim.
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Assemblyman, if you want to do something really useful, you should prohibit teams from taking names that were tailored for one geographic region and make absolutely no sense in another.
To wit – the Los Angeles Lakers? The team’s name, of course, made sense when they were playing in Minnesota, the land of 10,000 lakes. Can someone tell me why they kept that name in dry SoCal, other than for the sake of alliteration?
And the Los Angeles Dodgers were of course named in Brooklyn, and originally called the “Trolley Dodgers” in a reference to the borough’s web of trolley lines. There’s not a whole lot of trolleys to dodge in L.A. (Though you might want to watch out for that Orange Line).
And how ’bout that Utah Jazz …
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While we’re at it, why not have a law forcing entertainment writers to stop referring to “Hollywood” productions when everyone knows the studios long ago moved to the San Fernando Valley. Come on Valley legislators — force ’em to rename that famous song “Hooray for Burbank.”

With Democrats now in charge of both houses of Congress, lawmakers say they intend to pass immigration reform that includes a guest worker program as well as legalizing millions of undocumented immigrants.

Area Republicans who oppose such measures and label it `amnesty’ say they fear they no longer have the votes to stop it.

“I was very glad we’ve already passed the fence bill, because I don’t think we’d do that today,” Rep. Gary Miller, R-Diamond Bar said, referring to the 700-mile fence between the U.S. and Mexico that Congress authorized before the elections.

Of legalization measures, Miller said, “We’re gonna fight against it. But it’s got a very good chance now:”

At the White House Briefing this morning, Bush spokesman Tony Snow said the president “remains committed to border security.” But at the same time he stressed that Bush is open to compromise on the point of legalizing undocumented immigrants after making them pay a fine and back taxes.

Rep. David Dreier, R-Glendora, who had long professed a desire to see compromise on immigration reform but quickly took up border security as his No. 1 issue when faced with hoards of angry, illegal-immigration hardliners in his district, now says it may be “too early” for legalization measures.

“There’s a lot of work that remains to be done on the issue of securing our borders,” Dreier said.

It could be that men still dominate because election night is like the N.F.L.: its always two guys in the booth doing the play-by-play, while women cover the sidelines. Maybe its the women who avoid signing on to a lifetime of covering politics; the campaign trail is fattening and requires far too much math.

More likely, the election night throwback to the days of Brylcreem and cigarette smoke comes from a confluence of overconfidence and insecurity.

And there’s lots of Katie Couric analysis:

Since taking over the anchor chair in September, Ms. Couric has tried to insert some of her morning-show informality to the evening news, and that was in evidence even on election night. As she had said she would on her chatty blog on CBSNews.com, Ms. Couric worked some obscure trivia into her election-night conversation with Mr. Schieffer, including the fact that Jon Tester, the Democratic Senate candidate from Montana, lost three fingers in a childhood meat-grinding accident. She also wove in a word that is naughty by network standards: when discussing the Virginia Senate race, she cited the Democratic challenger Jim Webbs infamous description of the United States Naval Academy as a horny womans dream.?

In politics, it’s never too early to look ahead to the next campaign. Some Dem insiders are already handicapping the 2010 gov’s race and none other than our Mayor Antonio is considered the leading contender.

The word on MAV from a Dem blog: “The energizer bunny of California politics, he starts off with a strong base in LA, sky-high popularity ratings, instant appeal to Latino voters statewide, and connections to the resources he needs to run the race in both LA and Sacramento.”

The blog entry is on the California Majority Report (www.camajorityreport.com), run by Democratic staffer and consultant types. See the archives for Steve Maviglio’s entry for Nov. 8 titled “Governor’s Race: The Early Line on 2010”

Maviglio, by the way, works for Assembly Speaker Fabian Nunez, D-Los Angeles, who is rumored to be eyeing the mayor’s job after Antonio leaves. Some of the Sacto conspiracy theorists even went so far as to advance the somewhat silly idea that Nunez was cooperative with Arnold this year because he wanted him to win a second term, leaving the governor’s office an open seat in 2010 for Antonio — and therefore leaving the mayor’s office open for Nunez.

Kinda farfetched, but insiders in Sacramento love whispering about this kind of thing. Still, can’t really blame them for focusing on the 2010 race, given how uninteresting the actual 2006 race ended up being.

Maviglio writes this about his boss: “If you believe the black helicopter theories being advanced by Dan Walters and other columnists, the Speaker isn’t running for Governor but simply wants to fill Antonio’s shoes at LA City Hall when he runs for Governor. The Speaker is termed out in 2008. What he’ll do after that is anyone’s guess. ”

I finally remembered to check on the election for Superior Court Judge, Seat No. 144, since I heard candidate Janis Barquist speak at the Van Nuys Neighborhood Council meeting.

She lost. David W. Stuart won with 645,962 votes, or 58.88 percent, to Barquist’s 451,201 (41.12 percent).

Still, it was nice to hear from a living, breathing judicial candidate. And as they say, better luck next time.

Janis, you seemed to have it pretty together — lots of endorsements, getting yourself out there. It’s got to be hard to do this countywide. I don’t know how anybody can figure out what to do as far as campaigning goes over such a large area. Even a mailing would be too expensive. The Web site was a big help, but how do you get the name recognition needed to win? Hell if I know.

I suppose money is what really helps — getting yourself on “slate mailers” and doing advertising, in addition to speaking to community groups and distributing flyers. Oy, what a job.